James Lance Bass (/bæs/; born May 4, 1979)[3] is an American singer, dancer, actor, film and television producer, and author. He grew up in Mississippi and rose to fame as the bass singer for the American pop boy bandNSYNC. NSYNC's success led Bass to work in film and television. He starred in the 2001 film On the Line, which his company, Bacon & Eggs, also produced.[4] Bass later formed a second production company, Lance Bass Productions,[5] as well as a now-defunct music management company, Free Lance Entertainment, a joint venture with Mercury Records.[6]

When Bass was 11 years old, his father was transferred to a different hospital, and the family moved to Clinton, Mississippi[1] Bass began singing in his Baptist church choir, and was encouraged to audition for local performance groups by his childhood best friend, Darren Dale,[20] the youngest child of former longtime Mississippi Insurance Commissioner George Dale. Bass joined the Mississippi Show Stoppers, a statewide music group sponsored by the Mississippi Agriculture and Forestry Museum, and the Attaché Show Choir, a national-award-winning competitive show choir group at Clinton High School. He was also a member of a seven-man vocal group named Seven Card Stud, which competed at state fairs and performed at several social and political events for SenatorTrent Lott.[20]

At Clinton High School, Bass was elected vice president of his junior class[20] and has said that he performed well in math and science.[13][21] However, Bass later stated that his primary focus during high school was singing, and when looking back, he remembers "hardly anything" about academia.[20]

In 1995, during his junior year of high school, Bass received a call from Justin Timberlake and his mother, Lynn Harless, who asked Bass if he would be interested in auditioning for the pop group NSYNC after the group's original bass singer, Jason Galasso, had quit.[22] Timberlake's vocal coach (who had worked with Bass during his time as a Mississippi Show Stopper) recommended Bass as a replacement.[13][18][23] Bass was accepted into the group after auditioning in front of the other bandmembers and Lou Pearlman, and soon left school to move to Orlando, Florida, and rehearse full-time.[24] Bass has said that he did not know how to dance before he joined NSYNC, and therefore found much of the group's choreography difficult to learn.[18] According to an episode of VH1's Driven, Jan Boltz, president of BMG's German division, offered NSYNC a recording contract under the condition that they replace Bass, whose dancing, he felt, "wasn't at the same level as all the others."[22] However, the other members of the group refused to accept the contract without Bass, and the group's manager, Johnny Wright, convinced Bolz that Bass's dancing would quickly improve.[22] Bolz conceded, and the group soon moved to Munich, Germany to record their first album with BMG.[24] 'N Sync began extensive touring in Europe, and Bass's mother quit her job to tour with the group as a chaperone, as Bass was still a minor.[24]

Lance Bass in 2001

After gaining significant notability in Europe, NSYNC was signed to American record label RCA in 1997.[24] The group's first single, "I Want You Back" began receiving major radio play in the United States, and NSYNC soon found themselves becoming an "overnight sensation", a period which Bass describes in his autobiography as "the death of my own innocence".[24] Along with increasing fame and recognition in the United States the band also experienced a highly publicized legal battle with Pearlman, due to what the group believed were illicit business practices on his part.[25] NSYNC sued Pearlman and his record company, Trans Continental, for defrauding the group of more than 50% of their earnings, rather than his original promise of only receiving one-sixth of the profits.[25] The group threatened to leave and sign with Jive Records, which prompted Pearlman and RCA to countersue NSYNC for $150 million US, citing breach of contract.[26] The injunction was thrown out of court[25] and, after winning back their earnings, NSYNC signed with Jive.[27]

In March 2000, NSYNC released No Strings Attached, which became the fastest-selling record of all time,[28] selling 1.1 million copies in its first day of release.[23] In 2001, the group followed up with their Celebrity album,[29] which scored the second highest first-week album sales ever, trumped only by the group's previous album.[30] NSYNC went on to sell over 56 million records worldwide.[31] In 2002, the group announced that they would be taking a "hiatus", during which Timberlake began to record solo material.[32] 'N Sync has not recorded new material since, and Bass has stated that he feels the group has officially disbanded.[33]

In 2007, Bass stated that he had faith Timberlake would return after six months off to record another album with NSYNC, and that he felt betrayed by Timberlake's 2004 decision to pursue his solo career instead.[32] Bass has also said that he has little hope for a reunion, since Timberlake has "made it clear that he wouldn't be interested in discussing another album any time soon."[33] Despite these statements, Bass has denied that he harbors any ill feelings towards Timberlake, saying: "At that time... it did feel like betrayal. I felt heartbroken. All these emotions went through me. Today, I'm really happy, and Justin and I are really great friends. I don't hate him at all. And I understand what he was going through, and it was as hard for him as it was for any of us."[14]

In 2000, Bass formed a music management company named Free Lance Entertainment, which was a joint venture with Mercury Nashville, a division of Mercury Records.[6] Vowing to keep the company "a strictly family-run operation," Bass employed his parents and sister as talent scouts, and recruited childhood friend and aspiring country singer Meredith Edwards for the company's first release.[34] Edwards began touring with NSYNC as an opening act in the fall of 2000,[34] and Bass teamed up with MTV to hold a nationwide talent search for more artists later that year.[35] However, Free Lance soon folded after disappointing sales of Edwards's debut album, Reach.[35][36]

Bass guest-starred on the WB drama series 7th Heaven, playing Rick Palmer, a love interest for Beverley Mitchell's character, Lucy.[37] The following year, while NSYNC was in the midst of recording Celebrity, Bass received his first starring role in the 2001 motion picture On The Line.[38] Bass played Kevin, a man who falls in love with a woman on a Chicago train and begins a search to find her again. The film was produced by Bass's production company, A Happy Place (later renamed Bacon & Eggs), and featured appearances by Jerry Stiller, Al Green, Bon Jovi guitarist Richie Sambora, former WWE wrestler Chyna, and Bass's bandmates Timberlake, Kirkpatrick and Fatone, the latter in a major role.[38] The film also featured a soundtrack which included previously unreleased songs by NSYNC and Britney Spears. Bass collaborated with Joey Fatone, Mandy Moore, Christian Burns and True Vibe (as the "On The Line Allstars") for the film's theme song, "On The Line".[39]

Despite heavy marketing towards NSYNC teen fans, the film was a commercial failure, grossing only $4.2 million US domestically despite its $10 million US budget.[40] The film, along with Bass's acting, was also poorly received by critics.[40] Bass later said that he felt the film's success was greatly hindered by its release date, which came one week after the World Trade Center attacks of September 11, 2001. In his 2007 autobiography, Bass wrote, "That was it – our film was finished... once the country went to war, there was no way our film was going to be on anyone's top-priority list."[41]

In January 2001, Bass formed his first film production company, A Happy Place, with film producers Rich Hull, Wendy Thorlakson and Joe Anderson.[48] The company was geared towards family-friendly films,[37] and received the Movieguide award for "Excellence in Family-Oriented Programming" for its first feature film, On the Line.[49] After On The Line, A Happy Place changed its name to Bacon & Eggs[48] and produced its second feature film, Lovewrecked, in 2005. The film debuted on the ABC Family Channel in January 2007, and starred Amanda Bynes, Chris Carmack and Jamie-Lynn Sigler, with Bass in a minor role. This too received mostly negative reviews.

Bass later formed a separate production company named Lance Bass Productions.[5] On May 14, 2007, Brian Graden announced that Lance Bass Productions would be working with the Logo network in executive producing a reality television show about the music business.[50][51] It was reported that the show will focus on the creation and development of an all-gay boy band.[52] To date no such project has been developed or aired.

In 2008, Bass co-produced The Grand,[53] and Bass's company is reported to be developing a music docudrama about the life of rock bands on tour.[54]

In October 2011, Bass debuted his own boy band called Heart2Heart.[55] In August 2013, Bass became an executive producer of the documentary film Kidnapped for Christ along with Mike C. Manning. The film sheds light on controversial behavior modification methods used on children, sent there by their parents, at an Evangelical Christian reform school in the Dominican Republic.[56] The film was sold to Showtime, to be released on television July 10, 2014.[57]

Bass hosted Dirty Pop with Lance Bass, a daily evening drive time radio show focusing on pop culture and entertainment news on OutQ, a LGBT-geared station on Sirius XM.[58] Bass was also the host of the weekly "Pop2Kountdown" on Pop2K, which counts down the 30 biggest hits from that week from a different year in the 2000s.

Bass dated actress Danielle Fishel of TV's Boy Meets World throughout 1999 and 2000.[59] Fishel stated that she was heavily invested in the relationship, commenting that she was "so in love" with Bass.[60] Bass ended the relationship after one year,[14] and continued to exclusively date women until he was 22.[61]

In his autobiography, Bass documents two gay relationships that predated media speculation; one with a Miami, Florida, native named Jesse, with whom Bass lived for two years, and another with an Idaho native named Joe.[62] Bass began dating Amazing Race winner Reichen Lehmkuhl in early 2006, a courtship that garnered tabloid coverage and led to Bass's decision to come out.[9] Bass described his relationship with Lehmkuhl as "very stable";[9] however, the couple split several months later.[63] Shortly after his split with Lehmkuhl, Bass briefly dated Brazilian model and LXTV host Pedro Andrade.[64] From August 2007 to March 2008, Bass dated New York-based hairdresser Ben Thigpen.[65][66][67] After a year and a half of dating, Bass became engaged to Michael Turchin in September 2013.[68] Bass and Turchin married on December 20, 2014 in Los Angeles.[69]

The thing is, I'm not ashamed – that's the one thing I want to say. I don't think it's wrong, I'm not devastated going through this. I'm more liberated and happy than I've been my whole life. I'm just happy.[9]

Bass's announcement received a large amount of media attention. The American public's reaction was generally positive, with Bass receiving "overwhelming support" from many teenagers and young adults who grew up listening to 'N Sync.[80] However, Bass received criticism from the LGBT community when he referred to himself and his friends as "straight-acting" in his People interview, stating, "I call them the SAGs – the straight-acting gays. We're just normal, typical guys. I love to watch football and drink beer."[61] This comment angered some members of the LGBT community, who believed that Bass not only implied that effeminate gay men were not 'normal', but further enforced unneeded stereotypes.[80][81] In a 2007 interview with The Advocate, Bass called his comment a "mistake" and noted that he was unaware of the negative implications surrounding the term.[79] Bass stated, "Every community is hard to please. Our community is very fickle. It's a touchy community because it's the last civil rights movement we have left here in America. So when someone new like myself comes along and says off-the-mark things, yeah, I can see how people would get pissed."[79]

Bass found himself in the midst of further controversy later that year when he, along with then-boyfriend Reichen Lehmkuhl, was awarded the 2006 Human Rights Campaign Visibility Award on October 7, 2006.[10] The Washington Blade printed a guest editorial from a long-time HRC supporter who claimed that neither recipient had done enough to deserve the award and that The Human Rights Campaign was simply capitalizing on Bass's fame to sell tickets.[82] The Human Rights Campaign stood by Bass and defended his award, responding to critics by saying, "Bass is the biggest music star since Melissa Etheridge to come out, and maybe some people think HRC should just ignore these moments of cultural significance, but his declaration did initiate a positive, national conversation that continues today."[83]

Bass began dating painter and actor Michael Turchin in January 2011 and they became engaged in September 2013. They married on December 20, 2014 at the Park Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles. Former NSYNC bandmates Joey Fatone, Chris Kirkpatrick and JC Chasez were in attendance; Justin Timberlake, who was then headlining his The 20/20 Experience World Tour, was not present.[84] The ceremonial event was filmed and televised in a special E! presentation: Lance Loves Michael: The Lance Bass Wedding that aired on February 5, 2015.[85] Bass and Turchin were the first same-sex couple to exchange vows on cable television.[86] After four years of marriage, the couple decided to extend their family and have a child with the help of a surrogate.[87][88]

In February 2002, Lena Banks, a space advocate and founder/producer of Think Tank Ink Productions, contacted Lance Bass to propose his involvement in her Youngest Person in Space project. Banks brought her longtime associate David Krieff of Destiny Productions on board and through a series of events in August 2002, Bass entered cosmonaut training in Star City, Russia.[16] Bass was considered as the US host of a space competition show to be entitled The Big Mission, which had been successful in Denmark, in which several contestants would go through rigorous training in order to win a seat on a Russian Soyuzspace capsule. However, the game show concept was reconsidered, as the producers of the show decided it would be a much better idea to shoot a documentary of a celebrity actually training and going into space, and airing it on a major network. Lena Banks came up with the idea of the Youngest Person in Space many years before Dennis Tito had his historical flight. Through a series of events in early 2002 the chance of using Bass was presented when a colleague mentioned her space project to a friend and the friend's daughter shouted out, "Lance Bass wants to go into space!" The girl, who was an NSYNC fan, learned of Bass' lifelong dream of space travel when she read it online via a MTV forum.[16] Lena Banks spoke to Lance Bass's management who then went to him with the proposal. "At first he thought we were joking," Lena Banks remarks. "I assured him it was for real; he accepted and we moved forward with the project."

In order to be admitted into training, Bass had to go through strenuous physicals that saved his life. It was discovered he had cardiac arrhythmia, and he agreed to undergo heart surgery to correct it. Prior to this, in 1999, he collapsed after a concert because of his condition.[89] After several months of training, Bass received cosmonaut certification and went on to Houston's Johnson Space Center (JSC) to take part in astronaut training. He was scheduled to fly into space on the Soyuz TMA-1 mission that was to be launched on October 30, 2002. The capsule was scheduled to fly to the International Space Station and land in a desert in Kazakhstan.[7]

Several months before Bass was scheduled to fly, the original deal to air the documentary about Bass fell through. Bass's camp turned to MTV, who initially agreed to sponsor the trip but then backed out over "payment, insurance, and indemnification issues."[16] Shortly after, all of Bass's other sponsorships fell through, including one sponsor that pulled out because they worried about the image of their brand possibly being tarnished if Bass were to die on the mission.[16] Bass was eventually rejected from the program, and was replaced on the flight by Russian cosmonauts Yury Lonchakov, Sergei Zalyotin and Belgium's Frank De Winne.[8]

In 2003, Bass began serving as World Space Week's Youth Spokesman.[16] Bass has stated that he believes young people becoming more interested in space exploration "will help the future of our planet".[90] From 2003 to 2005, Bass spent World Space Week traveling to American high schools speaking with students about space exploration and encouraging them to explore careers in the fields of science and mathematics.[19] Bass is a member of the National Space Society, a non-profit educational space advocacy organization founded by Dr. Wernher von Braun.[19] Bass has served on the National Space Society's Board of governors since October 2004, alongside other space advocates such as actor Tom Hanks and author and futurist Sir Arthur C. Clarke.[19] In a 2007 interview with GQ magazine, Bass stated that he "absolutely" still intends on going to space, and that he hopes to work on a space documentary.[64] Bass has also retained fluency in Russian, which he was required to learn during his training.[65]

Following public response surrounding his coming out, Bass announced that he was releasing an autobiography. The book, entitled Out of Sync, was published on October 23, 2007.[91] It was co-written by The New York Times best-selling biographer Marc Eliot, who also wrote the book's introduction, and was published by Simon Spotlight Entertainment, a division of Simon & Schuster.[51][92] The 208-page book covers what Bass describes as "the first chapter" in his life, from his childhood growing up in rural Mississippi, to his efforts to obtain a seat on a Russian space capsule and the proceeding financial issues he had with his sponsors, and culminating with Bass's decision to go public with his sexuality.[91] The book includes details about boyfriends that he kept from family and friends, and recounts NSYNC's 2002 decision to go on an "extended hiatus". Bass stated that Justin Timberlake was the sole reason NSYNC did not get back together.[51][92]Out of Sync debuted on the New York Times Best Seller list for the week of November 11, 2007.[11]

Bass has been involved with a number of charities during his career. In 2001, Bass founded The Lance Bass Foundation, a non-profit organization that was designed to meet the health needs of low-income children.[5] In 2003, Bass donated $30,000 US to establish the Amber Pulliam Special Education Endowment at The University of Southern Mississippi.[93] The endowment is in honor of his younger cousin, Amber Pulliam, who has Down syndrome, and was established to financially aid students from Mississippi's Pine Belt who plan a career in special education.[93]

Bass is a member of the Environmental Media Association's board of directors.[97] He has also been involved with Animal Avengers, Shannon Elizabeth's animal rescue organization.[98] He has two dogs which he adopted from a rescue shelter, both of whom he posed with in a PETA ad urging people to adopt rather than buy animals.[99] In August 2007, Bass wrote a guest commentary for LOGO's "Visible Vote '08" blog, in which he expressed support for gay marriage.[100] In September 2007, Bass participated in a series of GLAAD television advertisements promoting tolerance for the LGBT community.[101] Bass has also been involved in fundraising for the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network.[102]